Turning Children into Free Adults

I have a vision for our sons. I see them being fully actualized, rational, thinking men who have been given plenty of time to consider who they are, what gifts and powers they have been endowed with, and how they wish to use those gifts and powers to make their way in the world. Having been emancipated from our will at the earliest reasonable moment they will be men who do not accept any work but that which they freely choose. They will be free and they will reject slavery wherever they see it, even when the manacles are pretty.

I envision men who will enter adulthood with plenty of painful mistakes, squandered time, and false starts under their belts. Good. Childhood is the time to learn that money walks away, that time can be wasted or used wisely, and that actions have consequences. I envision men who know this well because I did not protect them from their folly. If I impose my will on them, if I impose my schedule on them, if I impose my idea of what they will learn and when they will learn it, if I do not set their feet on the path that free men tread now, when they are children, there is the chance that they will never be free men.

This, above all else, is my task: to raise free men. Not to raise doctors, economists, computer programmers, engineers, musicians. No. Free men. Well-educated slaves are cheap. They are everywhere. It is not my task to create well-educated slaves. Civilization doesn’t need another generation of educated men who can not see the manacles on their own arms. What civilization requires from me is men who are free. I can not give the world free men except by having free sons.

They must practice decision making, time consuming as it may be. Messy as it may be. Circuitous as it may be. Frustrating as it may be. It would be much, much more efficient in the short run for me to make their decisions for them about what they study and when they study it just as it would have been more efficient for me to carry them from one point to another when they were infants. But a child who is carried when he can walk is a child who is being made helpless. It is a child being prepared for a master. That I will not do.

I will render unto the world men who love to work. Men who are keen. Men who can make decisions. Men who will choose their own way because they have been prepared to do so. I invite you to do the same. Raise daughters and sons who belong to no one but themselves. Raise daughters and sons who have practiced making decisions, practiced hard work, practiced taking charge of themselves. Raise daughters and sons who recognize and reject slavery when they see it. Give the world free women and men.